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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsYou Are Not Owed a Reason for Somebody's Abortion
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caitlin cruz (she/ella)
@caitlinrcruz
I've really struggled on how to fairly and accurately tell the story of the dismantling of abortion rights as Serious Reporter. I hope you'll read my essay for @Jezebel on my journey: You Are Not Owed a Reason for Somebody's Abortion
jezebel.com
You Are Not Owed a Reason for Somebody's Abortion
For too long abortion stories were split into "good" and "bad." And as a journalist, I walked right into that trap.
10:11 AM · Jan 25, 2022
https://jezebel.com/you-are-not-owed-a-reason-for-somebodys-abortion-1848317442?rev=1643127394643
Kaia was nearly 42 when she learned her fetus had a chromosomal abnormality that would likely lead to a painful death. Liz found out she was pregnant right after a long-distance relationship ended. Ophelia, already perimenopausal, was raising two children with mood disorders. Natalie wanted to be homecoming queen. Dima knew the dude wasnt right. Layidua was undocumented and attempting to change her immigration status after getting married. Yas was about to start her senior year of high school. Deb had just graduated college.
I have interviewed dozens and dozens of people who had abortions for dozens of articles. I have spoken to people who chose to self-manage their medication abortions at home, who chose first-trimester abortions in hospitals and clinics, who got later abortions, multiple abortions, secret abortions, people who got abortions as minors, whose fetus wouldnt survive, who did it to protect their health, who didnt want to be parents ever or just not right now, and who couldnt afford the procedure. Every one of these safe and wanted abortions was a good abortion.
After each interview I come away with profound disbelief that this is my lifes work: chronicling the stories of people who decide to divulge their private health information in service of others. They spill their abortion secrets in the hopes that their public honesty might mean those in power finally realize people who have abortions are simply that: people. I am so grateful for them. I wished I could offer them a better outcome than an accurate record of events. All I can offer them now is my own honesty.
It took me years to make so bold yet so fundamental a statement as every safe and wanted abortion is a good abortion on behalf of these people, because the notion of capital-J Journalism still had a hold over me. The profession has sworn, from William Randolph Hearst to Marty Baron, to not bring a point of view to practice; journalism forgets that Ida B. Wells was a reporter, too. I trained at newspapers in New Orleans, Seattle, and Phoenix. Even when I moved into political reporting, it was still a toe-the-line liberal blog. When I got to outlets that could take a bit more bite, I held back. I wrote about the fight for abortion access without explicitly mentioning the goodness of these choices. And I was fair, always trying to find the balance between pro- and anti-abortion sources and stories.
*snip*
50 Shades Of Blue
(10,085 posts)JanMichael
(24,897 posts)Solly Mack
(90,795 posts)MineralMan
(146,345 posts)Period.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,487 posts)talked about abortion access. Telling the most heart-wrenching stories about "why" people needed abortions implies people need valid backstories to get abortions, when the only reason they need is because they want one. That's it. I'm glad to see journalists understanding this better.
Bettie
(16,139 posts)Women have the right to make their own reproductive choices.
To have children, to not have children, to become or remain pregnant.
And it is no one's business but their own.
Hekate
(90,955 posts)DLevine
(1,788 posts)BeckyDem
(8,361 posts)Duppers
(28,130 posts)Ohio Joe
(21,771 posts)Response to Nevilledog (Original post)
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Nevilledog
(51,258 posts)crickets
(25,989 posts)drmeow
(5,032 posts)of the whole exceptions thing.
I always thought of the whole rare part of legal, safe, and rare with a positive spin - in the way abortion is less common in Scandinavian countries cause of birth control and sex ed but I could see the pro forced childbirth types twisting it.